Did the Jerusalem church pass-down Jesus-bio (to successors and other churches)?

  • Our question

    Whether or not all the churches were being mentored by the 1st church, is it nevertheless true that the Jerusalem church actively worked to mentor daughter churches and carefully pass down their stories of Jesus to them? Regardless of the Jerusalem church’s success in getting the stories to stick, were they at least actively passing down their Jesus-traditions, trying to disseminate them to the other churches?

“Yes, after all…

  • In general, early Christians passed down Jesus-bio

    AD 30-70 Christians orally inherited and passed down (i.e. popularized) storied reports about Jesus’s ministry. This page analyzes 7 evidences:

    • Examples abound.
    • Christians faithfully passed down Jesus-bio
    • Christians strove to faithfully pass down known Jesus-bio.
    • Christians oft strove to repeat/group-remember Jesus.
    • Teachers acted as primary transmitters of Jesus-bio.
    • Witnesses were actively relaying their testimony.
    • In general, they orally passed down community info (e.g. creeds).

    This provides a reason to think the Jerusalem passed-down Jesus biography to others because they were Christians par excellence.

    But no…

    • Gospel Jesus-bio was not passed down.
    • Christian Jesus-bio didn’t thrive.
    • They wouldn’t strive to faithfully pass it down.

  • 1st church STROVE to pass it down

    The Jerusalem church put significant effort into passing down the stories/reports of Jesus which circulated among them, and they strove to relay them faithfully.

    See this page to evaluate four supporting arguments:

    • The disciples revered Jesus's words as their rabbi.
    • Jesus was a formal teacher.
    • The 1st church did pass down Jesus-biography.
    • In general, early Christians strove to pass down Jesus-bio faithfully.

    If the Jerusalem church did really put effort into disseminating their Jesus-traditions to Christians throughout the Mediterranean (and the world), then it increases the probability that that they in fact did pass it down, i.e. that they accomplished what they set out to do.